Louder and Louder
by JealousOfTheMoon
Summary: Edmund's Call. 'The question is not what we intended ourselves to be, but what He intended us to be when He made us.'
1. It Started Out

_The title for this is lifted from the first line of Regina Spektor's 'The Call,' which you'll find on the PC soundtrack. I am thinking of turning this into a mini-series, but we shall see how far inspiration carries me. For now, it's just this oneshot, but I do have the next one written out—called Growing A Hope or something along those lines—if readers like the idea, I'll let it take off. The basic idea is to take an encounter with Aslan (most likely outside of Narnia) and link it to an event contained within Lewis's story. It will most likely centre around Edmund (about whom I am growing quite fond of writing...) but there's no saying it can't take an unexpected diversion from that.  
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_This particular story is dedicated to my father, who, when he was small and not unlike Ed in appearances and mannerisms, would count the ceiling panels in church with his older brother when they should have been otherwise reverently engaged. Many thanks go to Regina Spektor & CS Lewis (the latter being supreme author & owner of this fandom). Also, there's a quote taken from Isaiah 11:6. I think that takes care of disclaimers/dedication; on with the tale!  
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**1. It Started Out As A Feeling** _–JotM _

The Pevensie pew was a faded, battered affair situated towards the back of the sanctuary to allow for the hasty exits that were often necessitated by various screaming youngsters. On this pew, next to his fair-haired brother, sat a small, dark-haired boy with a deceptively solemn face. If he hadn't been so intolerably bored he might have appeared more accurately as mischievous, but he found his current setting rather dull.

The dark-haired boy yawned and blinked in a half-sleepy fashion, causing a few of the young, unmarried women with matronly ambitions (who had been surreptitiously watching the "Pevensie darlings" for the entire service) to internally melt into well-meaning goo. Even at a very young age, Edmund Pevensie tended to have that effect on the female sex, especially the young and motherly.

Right now his dark, childish eyes were fixed on the rafters above, almost as if he was engaging in reverent and solemn thought, or maybe engaged in a battle with his elder brother on who could most quickly count the finely polished panels that decorated the ceiling above. Suddenly, his eyes snapped back to the man with the bishop's collar who was reading the morning's text.

_"The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them."_

He didn't think much of wolves—nasty beasts!—and leopards were _alright_ he _s'posed_…but lions! He liked lions. That verse was better than anything else that pokey chap had ever said—suddenly he wished _God_ was a lion, or at least sometimes—not the type that are in the usual books where they roar and kill and have to be hunted, but the sort that followed little children around. The sort a chap would like to have on his side when older brothers were teasing him.

For a brief moment, he had a glimpse of a roaring lion—roaring not out of anger _at_ him, but _for_ him. The distinction did not make sense, really; he only knew it was a _good_ roar, and he longed to hear it again. A smile darted across his upturned face, and he was running to it and burying his face in its mane—and then! It flashed across him, like the sunlight dancing on his face, and he did not understand it—his small mind could not—but it was a feeling that enveloped him and held him—and it was so warm and golden and wild and _good_—

And then Peter nudged him and hissed, "Wake up, Dolly Daydream! _I'm_ all the way to eighty-seven!"

Eighty-seven?! There was no way he could count to half that! He crossed his arms and sulked a bit, resentment crossing his face and replacing the golden smile like an black smudge. He thought back to the lion, wishing that he would leap through that _ugly _colored window and just eat Peter up. _That_ would show _him!_

Suddenly, the thought of the lion made him cold, and he didn't understand. It was supposed to be _nice_, like it had been…

His mother grabbed his arm and told him to stop sticking his lip out and did he want his face to freeze that way and he forgot all about the lion and Peter and the panels on the ceiling and dozed off a bit…

It came back to him years later as he hunched over the Beavers' table. Mr. Beaver had just said it: _Aslan_, and suddenly the memory of the warm feeling in church so long ago returned. But it was all wrong this time. It was as if he knew the feeling was there, but knew it only as a memory. He was locked outside it—could sense the need for it, knew it existed, but could not get inside it, could not actually _feel _it. Instead of the warm, golden contentment he tasted a foaming drink and sickly, sugary sweets.

Then he saw his siblings' faces, radiant as if bathed with some inner light--and he knew. They could feel it. He couldn't.

He felt as if his stomach had turned to ice.

He wanted to run away to somewhere he could hide and be sick--sick with dread because he had to be so tainted, though he convinced himself he didn't know how, to be shut out of it all—for a moment he hated himself for being shut out of that _liony_ presence...

_Buck up_, he said to himself crossly. _It was only a feeling._

He was going to feel something soon that they wouldn't. He was going to feel power and glory and he was going to taste that wonderful food again, and they _wouldn't_. That would be enough.

It had to be.

As he stepped into the snow, he realized that although the icy, stony feeling in his heart might be _enough_, whatever he hadn't felt back there--it was better. And the cold rock in his heart squeezed a little tighter, grew a little colder, while what might have become tears of repentance froze in his eyes before they could fall.

_No going back now... _


	2. Growing a Hope

_This isn't at all how I intended this chapter to turn out. I wrote it completely differently a couple of days ago, neglected to post it because I didn't feel like it, and then had this thought and couldn't rid myself of it so I am using this instead. I like the other idea, too, so it shall come in later no doubt. _

_I realized I have no clue what the Pevensie parents' names are. I had an inkling from somewhere that Mrs. Pevensie's name was Helen, but I couldn't think of Mr. Pevensie's and somehow all the typical ones (Charles, John, Harold, Rodrigo) didn't fit. So for the purposes of this story, he's "Dad." It's Ed's POV anyways. But if anyone knows or has thought of a smashingly good name for him, I'd be happy to hear it. _

_This chapter is dedicated to anyone who has waited and waited for a good snow all year 'round and then gets a heap of wet slush (or even non-sticking powder) dumped on them._

**2. **_Which then grew into a hope_**–by JotM**

Edmund's forgotten many things, but he's never forgotten that day. He still remembers the grey of the sky and stifling quality of the air around him. It was the sort of day that won't decide if it's going to be cold or not. There was snow under his feet, but it was slushy...much too wet for a snowman or even an angel.

It was Christmas Day, Dad was leaving, the war had taken away all the presents, and the snow wasn't even fit for proper fun.

It wasn't _fair._

He'd glanced over at Peter, who was soaking up every bit of Dad's _'you're the man of the house now'_ speech, and scowled. He wanted desperately to kick a bit of snow at Peter's back (that'd give _him_ something to soak up!), but Dad's face was turned this way, and Dad wouldn't like that.

_Dad's leaving and there's no snow and the presents are gone and Peter's in charge. _It was a dark day indeed.

A hand landed on his shoulder, and his dad's firm voice broke through his bitter thoughts. "All right, then, Eddie?"

_Eddie_. Edmund tried to be upset at the long and loudly despised nickname but found (much to his chagrin) he couldn't. He settled for being sullen. "Sure," he shrugged. "_I'm_ all right." _And why shouldn't I be, hmm, Dad? The only thing that's wrong with the world is _everything._ Of course I'm all right!_

There was a moment of silence, while the child thought the above and the other accurately guessed the child's thoughts. Then—

"This snow's rotten," Ed broke out, unable to keep from complaining about _something_, even if it was the smallest of the mountain of problems. "Why d'you have to leave while it's all like this?"

"Ah, but Eddie," Dad responds gently. Edmund almost hates him for the gentleness. He'd just talked to Peter like _he_ was a man (Peter wasn't). Why was he handling him with kid gloves? "Eddie, the rotten snow is best because it shows that the winter is dying."

"Winter doesn't die, Dad," Edmund said stubbornly, contrary to the end. "It's a thing. It's not alive."

"It's also an expression," Dad interposed, "and when winter dies, we have hope, because we know that it means spring is coming." _'Stop saying we,' _Ed thought darkly, _'you're the only one doing any of this.'_ "Eddie, the winter dies so that other things can live!" He studied his boy's face and then sighed. Edmund thought Dad was disappointed with what he found there and wished with all his might he were a bit bigger and better—more like (he grudgingly admitted to himself) Peter. "I'm sorry things aren't—" Dad began, mostly likely about to say _better, _but then stopped and stared at his son a moment longer. "I'm sorry there's no good snow, Eddie," he finished somewhat lamely, wrapping the boy in a hug he knew he wouldn't appreciate much.

He'd tried to shrug off the hug, arching his back and wishing Dad wouldn't make him into such a little _kid. _Now he desperately wishes for the uniform-clad arms to hug him, ruffle his hair, tickle him while his Dad chants "Eddie! Eddie! Eddie!" over and over again just because he knows Edmund secretly loves the nickname.

There's no point dwelling on this now. He brushes it all away, tries to pretend that the broken picture he's got tucked in the bottom of his satchel makes up for the lack of everything that _Dad _is. He thinks of something else—thinks back to his Dad's words as he watches the snow around him disappear into green landscape—and almost agrees. He's gladder to see it go than his childhood self would have ever imagined possible. The slush almost makes him..._happy._

He watches a clump of snow fall from an evergreen's branch and thinks, _the Winter is dying._ The younger Edmund chants back, _winter doesn't die! It's a thing! _But even that childish protest fades, because he's wondered for some time whether the winter's mostly a part of himself—and he's pretty sure he's going to die soon himself. Perhaps he'll be a forgotten statue in this world of dying winter, if he's lucky. More likely his throat gets slit in some sick ritual. And yet…

_It dies so that other things can live._

Maybe the winter was dying to let things live—maybe _he_ was one of those things—maybe there was a chance—maybe—

"Make the foolish brat walk faster!" A whip cracks in his ear, bringing him back to reality. The light feeling that had been filling his stomach disappears as he finds himself in the mess that he's gotten himself into. He can't name the wrongdoings that brought about his current state—he isn't ready to admit his pride, greed, anger to himself yet—but he knows it was _all_ his fault.

Another clump of snow falls from a nearby tree branch with a quiet _poof!_ and he thinks bitterly to himself that even the snow wouldn't die for him if it could. What a fool he'd been to hope…!

And yet—he _had_ hoped. Even as the cold feeling in his chest wars against that, one cannot fight what does not exist. He doesn't know it yet, but the seeds have been sown already.

He spots a clump of crocuses growing at the base of a birch tree, golden, wild, and sweet.

Something else is growing.


	3. A Quiet Thought

..._continuing to move forward in the LWW plot. I'm not really sure how long this thing is going to follow the timeline, or whether I'll wind up jumping around more as I get farther in... that's all undecided. This one's shorter, but I rather like it--either that or I think it's too scrambled. I'm not entirely sure. _

**3. **_Which then turned into a quiet thought_ _–__**by JotM**_

"But Eddie—" Lucy pleaded, her eyes starting to brim with tears.

"Don't call me Eddie," he hissed, wanting to strike her but not daring lest Peter or Mum should be within earshot.

Silly kid—no, _stupid_ kid! Getting into his things, mucking about and then going and _breaking_ his model airplane, an exact replica of the one Dad flew—or rather, it _had_ been until it had lost one of its wings. Stupid kid.

"But Ed," Lucy insisted, "it was an _accthinent_."

"Look, if you're gonna witter on about it, you might as well _speak properly_," Ed said a trifle nastily. "Anyway, I guess you're just too little for this stuff—so just clear out before you have another _'accthinent.'_"

A hurt look crossed his sister's face. He didn't care. "I _thaid_ I was _thorry_," she quavered.

"Yeah, well, thanks for that," Edmund said coolly, "but I'm afraid 'sorry' isn't going cut it." He waved the broken airplane in her face.

When she had left the room (probably to go bawl her eyes out somewhere—baby!), he flung the plane against the wall bitterly. It was ruined anyway. _Stupid_ kid!

He's done it himself, now—mucked things up properly—but this time it's far worse than a broken toy, and it wasn't an 'accthinent' either. _His_ crime had been deliberate. _His_ crime had been committed with the intent to push himself up to the top and trample all over everyone else. _His_ crime had put everyone else in danger. _His_ crime is the reason there's a steely finger pointed his direction, leveling an undeniably true accusation his way…

The word "traitor" rings in his ears as he watches the Witch walk away with Aslan, the surety of an impending triumph written plainly across her face.

He doesn't know what's going to happen, and he doesn't know how he can possibly be saved.

Lucy hugs him, burying her face in his shoulder, and he struggles to keep from resisting the gesture. He's not used to all this, and he knows he doesn't deserve it.

He wishes he had a broken airplane and a wall to throw it at. He wishes that this were a childish quibble that Mum and Dad can smooth over, that all he has to do to get out of this is mutter 'sorry' and be done with that.

He shudders, and Lucy hugs him even tighter, murmuring, "don't worry, Ed—you're sorry for it and Aslan knows that," and he wants to scream out, _'you don't understand, you silly kid!'_ Instead, he bites his tongue, because the last thing he needs is the knowledge that he's made his sister cry—again. She's naïve and young, and he lets her be that way. She doesn't need to know what he knows.

He's afraid _'sorry'_ isn't going to cut it.

_(...Review!!) _


	4. A Quiet Word

Warning: _Mild language--a vulgar/profane expression is mentioned but not literally invoked. Let me know if it merits a rating change. _

Disclaimer: _The line from the scene in _Silver Chair _where Caspian, Eustace, and Jill execute vengeance on the bullies of Experiment House "Help! Murder! It isn't __**fair!**__" always makes me laugh, and since Lewis mentions in _LWW _that Edmund changed from a childish brat to a rather vicious one after he went to a "dreadful school" I figured that a similar line coming from him would not be amiss. So Edmund's references to fairness are not entirely of my own invention—nor is Edmund or anything else in this story. _

Description: Takes place in Edmund's past/between the Witch's visit to Aslan's Camp and Aslan's sacrifice_…otherwise self-explanatory, except for the fact that this is _bookverse_, because I _hate_ the way that tree tells Edmund & Peter that Aslan is dead in the film. C.S. Lewis specifically didn't tell him immediately—I imagine he learned later when he was a little more ready for it—but that was the most irritating difference between film and book—that and Aslan living in a tent (hello? Do the words _not a tame lion _ring a bell, anyone?). Rant over. Story on. _

**4.** _Which then turned into a quiet word_ –by JotM

"_Ed_mund!" His mother's scandalised voice cut through the air. "Don't say things like that!"

"I'll say whatever I _bloody_ want," Ed repeated half the tabooed expression, jutting his chin out defiantly. "I'm wretchedly tired, Mum, and you can't blame me. Dad isn't home and you can't make me because you're rubbish at this without him."

He stalked to the stairs and took every other one two at a time—his legs were not yet long enough to take them. _Why_ did he have to be shorter than Lucy? Life just wasn't _fair_, he moaned inwardly as he threw himself onto his bed. Someone began sobbing downstairs—Mum. Heaving a sigh, he began counting aloud.

"5…4…3…2…"

Peter appeared in the doorway, a livid expression on his face.

"…1. Hallo, Pete," Ed said with just enough casualty for insolence. "You're right on time and really predictable."

"You little beast!" Peter fumed. "Don't let me catch you speaking like that to Mum again—or next time I'll—"

"You'll what? Put on your best imitation of Dad? Blimey, just look at me—I'm shaking!" The significantly smaller brother mocked, relishing the feel of poking at the thin ice he was currently standing on. "Run along and play with Susan."

Crack! The ice broke—and so did Peter's temper. It is rather difficult to tell what happened afterwards, only that it was a rather large and messy scuffle which resulted in Peter sitting on Edmund's head and Edmund hollering "Mum! Peter's killing me! Oi, stop it you! Mum! Help! Murder! Bully! It isn't _fair! …Mum!_ "

_That memory ends, but the dream does not. Instead, it shifts from one memory to another, and Edmund finds himself tied to a tree as the Witch sharpens her knife. This time, no one comes to rescue him and she plunges it deep into his heart. _

_There's blood everywhere and he tries his hardest to scream, but nothing comes out and nothing hurts so he stops. Another look confirms that the blood isn't his. It's mingled with golden hair and fur and there's the sweetest, saddest aroma—so different from the usual, bitter-metal scent that he wants to sob and laugh at the same time. But he can't because it's not _his blood_ and he's had the Witch's words "his blood is mine!" ringing through his mind all day and it's no good if it isn't his. _

_Flames leap up around him, and it's no more than he expects. As flames lap at his clothes the words "your fault! Your fault!" ring through his mind. Something roars behind him and he whirls to find a wave towering over him—fire and water. _

_Somewhere in the back of his mind, he tells himself that he'll never say _those words_ again—not because Mum cried and Peter threatened, but because now he knows what a "bloody hell" really is. _

_He wakes up shaking and crying and wonders why he is relieved, begins to hope that maybe the blood in his dream means that there is reason to hope. (He doesn't know how or why he can hope for a reason to hope because everything he learned at school indicates some sort of logical or theoretical impossibility that way, but then school also taught him this place is theoretically impossible, and he doesn't think much of theoretics anymore.) _

_He thinks later that he only made it through the Battle of Beruna because the sweet aroma of his dream lingers, replacing the smell of death and suffering around him. _


	5. Louder and Louder

_I'm not happy at all about this chapter. It seems too much of a rehashing of 'Just Redemption', but the scene needed to be done for the sake of the story. Bear with me and I'll get you something better next chapter._

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**Christ says 'Give me All. I don't want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work:_ I want You._ I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half measures are any good. I don't want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don't want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked--the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: My own will shall become yours.' **(C.S. Lewis)

**_5. And then that word grew louder and louder _**_–by JotM_

When it comes to honesty, he didn't exactly have the best record in the books.

_He jerks his elbow carelessly, whirls around to catch glimpse of the vase as it falls. His hands fling out towards it uselessly. There is a deafening crash, he leaps from his perch on the back of the easy chair, feet come running…and then Mother's in the doorway, hands on her hips. _

"_Eddie. What happened here?" _

'_I jogged my elbow and it fell. That's not so hard to say, Ed. Go on, say it,' his mind chanted. 'Just…I jogged my elbow and it fell…but what if she asks me was I climbing on the furniture? I can't say yes to that.' _

"_Lucy pushed me and then I tripped and knocked it off." He prayed his mother was inobservant and didn't notice that he'd have to have tripped _upwards_ to reach the vase. _

"_Hmm." She appeared to be actually thinking about this, which was never a good sign. "Where is Lucy now?" _

"_She ran off when it fell." 'That's two lies now!' his mind chanted, but he was beginning to be hardened to the whole thing and pushed the thoughts away. _

"_Lucy," his mother said firmly, and he knew the jig was up, "has been sitting at the kitchen table helping me with dinner for the last half hour." _

_Oh._

"_Maybe it was Peter…I didn't see _who_ pushed, exactly…" _

He'd been more honest about himself for the last day or so. It is quite easy to consider your own pitiful state when you have been forced to slog through mounts of slush with the threat of a whip at your back and then tied to a tree and nearly had your throat slit. Once the threats and the pain have gone, one begins to feel a little surer of oneself. What's more, it is quite simple to convince yourself that you were manipulated or tricked into committing all the bad things in the past.

Outside of the Witch's clutches at last, Edmund had begun to feel less miserable about himself. He had never had basic theology explained to him (or if it had been, he hadn't been paying much attention) and the idea of repentance was rather foreign.

"Son of Adam, do you know what you have done?"

Of course Edmund had, in the euphoria of freedom, considered making excuses, or denying everything, or even pleading insanity. _Confession_ was not something that came naturally to him; he had always been a habitual liar, but more out of out of necessity than malicious intent (or so he told himself; later he would wonder if such a difference actually existed). One look at the Lion's face showed him a closed door on the lying option – closed and locked and barred. Suddenly he felt that nothing would do here but The Truth.

"I—I thought to sell out my siblings, Aslan," he said slowly, Truth feeling sticky and nasty in his throat. He wanted something to cover the revelation of his rottenness, and began to hedge, avoiding Aslan's eyes. "At least I didn't think I was doing it at first—I mean, she said she would make me a king, and—and I think her food tricked me somehow."

"Did it?"

"I suppose it didn't," he confessed. To his great surprise, his voice was suddenly very hoarse. The words seemed to want to sink into his stomach rather than leave his throat. "I suppose I knew all along what I was doing—I wished deep down that she would just get rid of them all."

"You lied to them," Aslan put in quietly. "You hated them." There was nothing accusatory in his tone, but the words were true and Edmund knew he stood condemned.

"I—I've been a regular beast—and—" A terrible realization, more dreadful than any previous realizations, crept over him like darkness over a valley of despair. He wished not to have to say the words, but they would not be held back, so he hung his head and said, very lowly "but Aslan—I think I hated you more than anything or anyone else."

"Do you hate me now?"

"No—well—no, I don't. That's a start, isn't it? I mean, I'm not wishing you dead anymore or running away, if that's any better. Is it better?"

"It is not enough to not hate, Child. The emptying of one black emotion from the soul leaves only room for another, perhaps blacker, sentiment."

"But then I'm rubbish? Is that what you mean to say, that I'm just going to be full of … blackness?" A question, which he dared not say aloud, rang unspoken in the air: _Why didn't you let the Witch finish the job? Why bother to save me?_

"You must guard the empty place hate leaves, and seek for something better, something whole and new, to fill it." It sounded like something someone would say in church (or rather, the sort of church he'd been forced to attend at school), only he thought Aslan might actually mean it.

"You mean I need to not hate you but love you instead," Edmund said glumly. "That's no good—I mean, I do not think I can love you yet, Aslan. I do not even know you."

"You will love me as you come to know me," Aslan said.

"Is it enough?" Edmund asked, though he felt all at once as if it might be. "I—I think perhaps I have quite a lot of blackness in me, too much. I do not think I can love you enough _now_—how shall I love you enough when I know you better?"

"Son of Adam, it is not your love that will fill that empty blackness you call a heart, but my own. I know you, and I know your blackness. It is deeper than you can ever imagine, but I have loved you in spite of it."

"Please, sir," Edmund trembled a little. He did not understand very much of this, but he wanted to desperately—and didn't want to. It all seemed so strange and terrible and hopeless. "I don't know if I'll ever be able to—I—that is—I'll go with the Witch, if you want," he said. "I don't think she'll leave you alone till I'm dead. I mean, it seems the easiest way—"

"That will not be necessary," Aslan interjected with a hint of a growl, and Edmund thought maybe he'd said something terrible: not for any anger on the lion's face, but for the expression of utter sadness. "And now, you had better go see about your brother and sisters."

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_If anyone thinks Edmund's offer to die is too selfless or whatever, it really isn't. He's scared about the future and dying seems the easy way out. Of course he doesn't really know what he's getting into either way, which is why he makes such a rash statement... _


End file.
